Facebook Gaming has surpassed YouTube Gaming for the first time ever, as recent data showed that more people spend time on Facebook's platform watching their favorite streamers.
Facebook Gaming surpassed YouTube Gaming
According to Streamlabs, which published its Q3 201 Live Streaming Industry Report on Oct. 27, Facebook Gaming is now the most-watched gaming platform.
The company stated that the viewers watched 1.29 billion hours of content on Facebook Gaming between August and September, representing a 92.% increase from the previous quarter.
Meanwhile, the number of content people watched on YouTube Gaming went from 1.294 billion hours in Q2 2021 to 1.13 billion hours in the most recent three-month period. In terms of viewership, Google's platform has seen a steady decline since it hit a peak at the end of 2020.
The struggles of YouTube are surprising since the platform spent massive amounts on promotion to secure very famous talents like TimTheTatman and DrLupo, according to Engadget.
Steamlabs attributes the milestone to Facebook Gaming's international popularity, aside from the recent rollout of features like co-streaming.
Whether Facebook can continue to surpass YouTube Gaming is hard to say. Over the same timeframe, the platform saw a decline in both the total number of hours streamed and unique channels.
Those stand at 17.1 million and 440,000 currently, showing a decline of 17.8% and 48% from the previous quarter. Basically, Steamlabs predicts Facebook Streaming is on the right path.
As for Twitch, it ran into its own issues. People watched 5.79 billion hours of content in the second quarter of 2021.
Obviously, that is more than Facebook and YouTube combined, but it is also an 11% decrease from the viewership numbers it saw in Q2 2021.
The above number represents a yearly decline of 22%. Also, Twitch saw, for the first time, an annual decline in unique channels, with that number decreasing from 10.6 million in the third quarter of 2020 to 10.4 million in the third quarter of 2021.
Still, with a 70% share of the market in terms of hours that is watched, Twitch remains the dominant platform in the space, and that is unlikely to change anytime soon.
Facebook Gaming Co-Streaming
The sudden increase in Facebook Gaming's viewership could be attributed to its latest features, according to TechCrunch.
Earlier this month, the platform added co-streaming so all users on Facebook Gaming and collaborate with their favorite creators.
The feature gives you a chance to team up and stream with other creators while enabling viewers to switch between co-streams and choose which idea they would like to listen to.
The feature had previously only been available to streamers in Facebook Gaming's partner program, but it is now seeing a wider release. The feature is currently limited to four co-streamers at a time.
With the feature, Facebook Gaming wants to increase the chances of discoverability for creators. The feature also encourages collaboration and increases the overall viewing experience for users.
Facebook also launched the fan groups feature for Facebook Gaming so creators can chat with their fans.
Facebook Gaming has been bulking up its capabilities as it aims to get a bigger slice of the game-streaming pie and get ahead of its competitors, YouTube Gaming and Amazon's Twitch.
Facebook Gaming is doing a great job in surpassing the growth of YouTube Gamings. However, Twitch still remains the most popular gaming service when it comes to hours streamed and hours watched.
This article is owned by Tech Times
Written by Sophie Webster
